Acora runs the relationship. RMS runs the rooms. DDSN unifies.

DDSN Interactive, Acora CMS and RMS Cloud have formed a strategic partnership: a considered implementation and certified integration of two specialist platforms, covering the whole residential lifecycle for Australia's colleges and student residences.

 

Student experience by the Acora Digital Experience Platform.

Room Management by the RMS Cloud.

Laptop and smartphone screens displaying the St John's College Website, alumni portal and student engagement app

Five systems, one student, and the gaps in between

A residential college is an admissions office, a landlord, a kitchen, a support service and a foundation — all at once. No single software category was built for that. So you run one system for applications, another for billing, a roster for meals, spreadsheets for rooms, and email for everything in between.

Every handover drops data. Every semester start is a scramble. And the student who lived with you for three years leaves as a row in a spreadsheet instead of an alumni relationship.

Run a student residence instead of a college? Same story, sharper edges. Enquiries in one inbox, applications in another system, agreements in a third, room state in a fourth — while occupancy targets and owner reporting wait on whatever the spreadsheet says this morning.

The problem is not your team. Nobody ever built one system for all of this — and we won't pretend we have either.

With RMS Cloud, we've done something more considered: taken the platform that's best at relationships and the platform that's best at rooms, and implemented and integrated them to run your whole lifecycle.+

Work with us

 

Two specialists, side by side

Acora by DDSN

Acora is the community platform built for membership-style organisations — residential colleges, student residences and member bodies. It runs the whole relationship: enquiry capture, applications and offers, licence agreements, fees and Xero-connected billing, meals, pastoral and resident support, and alumni engagement. Configured to each community rather than a fixed SaaS mould, Australian built, and supported by DDSN Interactive long after launch.

RMS Cloud

RMS is the cloud-native property management platform built to help hospitality businesses grow — from a single property to enterprise groups with 100+ locations. Powered by a single enterprise data architecture, RMS brings operations, bookings, revenue, payments and guest experiences together in one connected platform, giving teams greater efficiency, group-wide visibility and the flexibility to scale with confidence.

Between them sits the certified integration — built, owned and supported by DDSN under the partnership.

Book a residential lifecycle review

One record, every stage

Acora by DDSN runs the relationship. RMS Cloud runs the rooms. A certified integration keeps them in step, so the record that starts at first enquiry is the same record at the alumni dinner.

Awareness
Your website, open days and enquiries, captured and nurtured — not lost in an inbox.
Acora
Application
Applications, references, interviews and offers in one flow.
Acora
Contracting
Agreements signed digitally, guarantors included for under 18s.
Acora
Fees
Invoices, payment plans and reminders, connected to Xero.
Acora
Meals
Meal plans, dietary needs and tomorrow’s kitchen numbers.
Acora
Student support
Pastoral notes, programs, events and communications on the student’s record.
Acora
Rooms
Configuration, allocation, check-in and check-out, built for exactly this.
RMS Cloud
Offboarding
Departures, bonds, condition reports and exit surveys, triggered automatically.
Acora + RMS
Alumni
The three-year resident becomes a lifelong member, not a closed file.
Acora
Awareness
Enquiries captured and nurtured from every channel.
Acora
Application
Applications to offers in one flow, no re-keying.
Acora
Contracting
Agreements signed digitally, guarantors included.
Acora
Fees
Billing, payment plans and arrears visibility, connected to Xero.
Acora
Rooms
Allocation, check-in, check-out, housekeeping and maintenance.
RMS Cloud
Residency
Requests, communications and community events on one record.
Acora
Renewal / Offboarding
Re-sign your best residents early — or run departures, bonds and condition reports without the paper chase.
Acora + RMS

Two platforms. One integration. No gaps.

  • The student record lives in Acora. Room state lives in RMS. The certified integration keeps them in step: an accepted offer in Acora creates the booking in RMS; a check-out in RMS triggers offboarding and bond workflow in Acora.
  • Fees stay unified. Room charges flow into the same Acora invoice and the same Xero ledger as everything else. Your bursar reconciles one system, not three.
  • RMS is cloud native with an open API; Acora integrates through it. The integration is named, documented, and supported by both partners under the partnership agreement.
  • Each platform is licensed from its maker — Acora from DDSN, RMS from RMS Cloud. DDSN owns and supports the integration, so for anything about the connected experience, we're your first call. You are never left between two vendors.

Built for the people who run the place

Head of College / CEO

One accurate picture of every student, from first enquiry to alumni dinner. Governance and duty-of-care reporting from a single record — not five exports and a prayer before council.

Bursar / Finance Manager

One ledger. Fewer reconciliations. Xero connected. And a new income line: RMS's hospitality engine lets you let empty rooms to conference and holiday guests through the breaks, with dynamic pricing, without touching the student ledger.

Registrar / Admissions

Applications, offers and contracts in one flow. Semester start without the scramble.

Operations Manager

Allocation, check-in, check-out, housekeeping and maintenance in a system built for exactly that — run by accommodation providers in 70+ countries.

Running a student residence?

One system of record from enquiry to renewal. Applications, agreements, billing and room state stay in step, so turnover runs on workflow, not spreadsheets. Occupancy and arrears are visible in real time for owner reporting — and dynamic pricing puts vacant beds to work.

We already work where you work

DDSN Interactive builds and supports digital platforms for Australia's residential colleges — including Trinity College at the University of Melbourne, St John's College at the University of Queensland, and New College at UNSW. What you implement with your platform varies with your operational needs.

Trinity College
University of Melbourne

Logo of DDSN Client - Trinity College, University of Melbourne

DDSN has implemented for Trinity:

  1. Website
  2. Email marketing and multistep nurture campaigns
  3. Application, shortlisting & acceptance portal for students
  4. Application management portal for staff
  5. Fee collection
  6. Donations
  7. SSO

St John's College
Universtity of Queensland

Logo of DDSN Client - New College, University of New South Wales (UNSW)

Acora Features used by St John's UQ:

  1. Website
  2. Email marketing 
  3. Fee collection
  4. Student mobile app
  5. Student forms - e.g. maintenance request
  6. Alumni portal
  7. Donations

New College
UNSW

Logo of DDSN Client - New College, University of New South Wales - UNSW

New College putting Acora and RMS together

  1. Website, microsites & landing pages
  2. Email marketing
  3. Application, shortlisting & acceptance portal
  4. Contracting & room allocation
  5. Under 18s duty of care management
  6. Student mobile app with meals tokens & cafe credits
  7. Staff checkin and out
  8. Anonymous reporting
  9. Fee collection
  10. Donations
  11. Event ticketing
  12. SSO

Questions we'd ask too

So does everyone. The question is how many systems sit around it, and what falls between them. Most residential communities run five or more — applications here, billing there, rooms in a spreadsheet — and every gap between systems is a gap in the student's record. The lifecycle above is the test: if one record doesn't travel all nine stages, the database isn't the platform. Read: The 5-System Trap.

 Two contracts, yes — Acora is licensed from DDSN, RMS from RMS Cloud, and we won't pretend otherwise. But one certified integration, owned and supported by DDSN under a formal partnership. For anything about the connected experience, you call us. That's the arrangement, in writing.

Agreed — which is why the relationship layer is Acora, built for membership-style communities: admissions, pastoral care, formal hall, alumni. RMS handles only what a college genuinely shares with hospitality: rooms, beds, arrivals, departures. Each platform does what it's best at. That's the point of the partnership.

Yes. The pairing covers the lifecycle, and the stages you don't run — formal hall, pastoral programs, alumni giving — simply switch off. What remains is exactly your stack: enquiry, application, agreement, billing, rooms, renewal. With a hospitality-grade rooms engine and dynamic pricing underneath it.

Tailorable is the point. Acora is configured per community — scholarships, formal hall, res-life programs, pastoral structures, your fee rules — not a fixed SaaS mould you bend your college around.

Less than you'd guess from this page. Acora is priced for mid-market colleges and operators, well below enterprise student-systems territory, and the lifecycle review below includes a frank conversation about numbers before anyone signs anything.

Your community runs on relationships. Your platform should too.

The review is free: we map your current systems against the residential lifecycle, stage by stage, and show you where the record breaks. You keep the map either way.

Call us on  1300 656 412 for a chat or make a booking in our calendar for an assessment of your residential lifecycle.

Book a residential lifecycle review